The present invention relates to a dryer or oven of the type utilizing radiant burners and through which a substrate is conveyed for drying or otherwise heating.
Prior dryers or ovens of this general type have radiant burners mounted within the enclosure of a housing to confine the heating generated by the burners. The walls of the housing are conventionally made of insulating material such as felted ceramic fiber mats. One aspect of the present invention provides an improvement by utilizing radiantly reflective surfaces on wall panels facing the burners for efficient reflective re-radiation of heat from opposed burner units. This is particularly advantageous when the housing is relatively narrow and the panels are arranged directly opposite the burner units for most efficient re-radiation. An example of the less efficient prior art is found in Smith U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,604,054 and 4,722,681, which disclose radiant burners in ovens having housings with felted ceramic fiber mats rather than radiantly reflective panels, and particularly do not teach or suggest such panels in opposition to radiant burners.
In drying or heating a continuous length of material, such as textile fabrics, the material may travel in a sinuous path through a housing along parallel path segments with burners arranged in facing relation to each path. In such an arrangement it is conventional for all of the burners to be contained in a single housing without partitions, resulting in the heat being dissipated throughout the housing and not concentrated on the traveling material. In contrast, one of the aspects of the present invention involves arranging the radiant burners and opposed radiantly reflective panels in narrow parallel chambers through which the material passes in a sinuous path, thereby confining the heat and avoiding the dissipation in a large housing, and also allowing the backs of the burners to be exposed outside the chambers in a relatively cool condition for ease of servicing by access in the space between adjacent chambers.